Spirit of the Ancient
by firevithral
Summary: Legolas needs to go on a quest to stop the world from being destroyed. However, he needs to deal with a moody spirit with attitude and a feisty young human female first. My first fic! Please read/review!
1. You have to do this so deal with it

This is all Tolkien's property! I do not own Legolas or Middle Earth or anything to do with LOTR! Also, this story takes place in this random other world thingy. I had a dream and I wanted to write it down. So here goes, hope you like it. :)  


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Legolas knew that there was some special reason that he was out here at this meeting. Some reason that might even save the world one day. Some reason that made each every one of the elders eager for his arrival and for his acceptance. The only problem was that he didn't even know what the reason _was_.

He peered through the curtain nervously. The elders were talking, probably about this whole reason thing. He hoped that, whatever it was, it was going to be easy.

'Legolas Thranduilion,' he heard a voice say. _Oh no,_ he thought.

'We request that you show your appearance in front of the court.'

Legolas stepped through the curtain and looked around. There were a lot of old men gazing solemnly at him. Legolas lazily examined them and resisted the urge to smile when he saw that one of them was wearing pink Velcro shoes that completely contradicted the serious look on his face.

One of them cleared his throat. All heads turned to him. Legolas looked at him curiously. He was slightly different than the others, though he still looked old. There was a certain mischievous twinkle in his eye that the others lacked.

'Pardon me,' the old man said quietly. 'But there is a time to stare, and there is a time to discuss. And now we need to discuss the issue of this here boy and the problem, which is now that the lad doesn't even know why he was sent here in the first place.'

There were murmurings among the crowd. Legolas almost bit his lip, then remembered that he was in the company of the elders and worked on trying to hold on to his dignity while at the same time trying to look politely confused and appreciative of the old man's statement, which was very true, in his opinion.

'Legolas, my boy,' the old man said, turning to him. 'To you I ask this very question: _do _you have any idea what is going on?'

'To be quite honest, Sir, no,' said Legolas.

'Ah, then. Very well. To start with, you may call me Mr. Ray, or as my grandchildren's friends like to say, Wizie.'

'Um… okay, Sir,' Legolas said, slightly confused. He gathered from this that the old man was most probably a wizard, then.

'Or if you want to be formal,' the old man said, sighing, 'You may call me Rayus.'

'Yes, Sir,' Legolas said, still confused.

'Now, before I start explaining things, let us bring your fellow companion in so that she may hear us as well.'

_Who? Nobody came with me._

Just then, from behind another curtain at the back, a girl stepped forth. She had the strangest hair. It was long and blonde, yet there was something about it that made it almost glow and look more strawberry in the light. Freckles dotted her face and she had curious turquoise eyes that immediately landed on Legolas. She reached up to brush away a strand of hair that had fallen in front of her eyes. She was wearing a long blue dress. Legolas judged her to be somewhere between sixteen and twenty. He wasn't that good at guessing human ages, but being with Estel for so long had given him practice.

'Annabel,' the wizard said, welcoming her. 'This is Prince Legolas of Mirkwood.'

'Of where?' asked the girl.

'Mirkwood,' repeated Mr. Ray. 'A place in Middle Earth.'

'Oh,' said Annabel. 'So he's from,' she gestured wildly and randomly. 'Somewhere else, then?'

'Yes. Please, sit down.'

Legolas frowned. Nobody had offered _him _a place to sit.

'Prince, you too.'

Legolas nodded and looked around. The only extra seat was a place next to the girl, who was fidgeting. Legolas made his way over gracefully and sat down, back straight, at attention.

Annabel peeked at the elf next to her. From what she had heard, elves were immortal. She wondered how old this one was. He looked young, but you never knew.

She stared at him until he turned and caught her eye. He had the bluest eyes Annabel had ever seen. She looked ahead quickly, blushing slightly. He continued to examine her, and then, finally satisfied, he looked back at Mr. Ray, who had begun to talk.

'Lady Annabel, Prince Legolas, you are here today for a meeting, obviously. This meeting will choose whether or not you are able and willing to embark on a specific quest.'

Legolas relaxed in his seat. He had heard this speech before, at the time of the Ring. It was good that they had chosen him; he had been getting a bit bored.

'Your mission is to recover an ancient… uh, thing-'

One of the elders cleared his throat. Mr. Ray looked at him and then back at Legolas and Annabel before continuing.

'-that contains a spiritual possession inside.'

Legolas frowned. 'Spiritual possession?'

'By spiritual I mean magical, my dear boy. It is an artefact, located in the depth of a jungle. It is admitting energies that are somehow disturbing the balance of nature and corrupting this jungle.'

'Define "corrupting",' said Annabel.

Mr. Ray looked at her. 'At first it was only changing some plants, making them bigger and then dangerous. Then it reached the animals. They began morphing and attacking the inhabitants of a nearby village. Now the villagers are changing. There is evil in their hearts. It is spreading throughout the jungle and into other places as well.'

'You want us to go into the heart of the jungle,' Legolas began slowly. 'And find this artefact, which is the cause of the morphing and the evil. And then we destroy it?'

'Destroy it or shut it down,' Mr. Ray said, nodding.

Legolas glanced sideways at Annabel. She looked a bit frightened.

'Of course, you will be going as a pair.' Another elder spoke up. 'Each one of you possesses abilities that the other has not and will be a great aid.'

Annabel didn't at the moment look like that much of a warrior, but Legolas said nothing. If he had to protect a human maiden through this whole thing, so be it.

Annabel felt Legolas examining her again. She wondered if he thought that she would be a burden. But then he smiled, and she relaxed. Well, they _would _get to know each other anyway, so she'd just see about that.

'I apologize if I am not able to give you too many details,' the wizard said. 'But even the little I have given you already might not be exactly correct. We do not know, and that only makes it even more dangerous.

Legolas nodded. 'Alright,' he said. 'I will go.'

'Excellent. Lady Annabel?'

'Yeah, okay,' said Annabel. She didn't seem so certain, though.

'Wonderful. I apologize if this might seem a little sudden, but you see, we had no idea that you did not know until now. You're lucky I guessed that. Actually, the look on Legolas' face sort of gave you away. Anyways, you will be leaving the morning after tomorrow. I hope to see you at the feast next evening.'

With those words, the meeting was over. In Legolas' opinion, it had been pretty short.

After all the elders had gone, Legolas motioned to Annabel. He wanted to talk to her.

'Yes?' she said when she had come over.

He smiled and offered her his arm. 'Can we talk?' he said.

She blushed and took his proffered arm. 'Sure. Let's go outside in the garden, it's too stuffy in here.'

Legolas chuckled and led her to the garden.

'Have you come here before?' he said.

'Nope,' she said. Then, looking right into his eyes, 'How old are you?'

He was surprised at her question. 'Uh… nearly three thousand years old, why?'

'Oh,' she said. Then, 'Do you have a girlfriend?'

He stared at her. Did human maidens always ask questions like this?

'N-no, why?' he asked.

'Oh, good,' she said happily.

Annabel found it very much to her advantage that he didn't have a girlfriend. That meant that he was free. She found herself smiling as Legolas looked at her with an extremely confused look on his face. He _was _really cute.

Annabel came from a modern, twenty-first century world. She didn't know how old-fashioned Middle Earth was, but it had to be pretty old for people to be still using bows and swords. Oh well. She was a pretty experienced swordswoman herself. Guns were too messy and quick for her.

She also felt extremely privileged to be travelling with an elf. And a prince at that! She would have a lot to tell her brother when she got back.

Legolas looked at the girl and bit his lip. He was having second thoughts about this.

'That's a nice dress you're wearing,' he commented, trying to start a conversation.

'Oh really? Thank you! My sister bought it for me.'

'Annabel…' he began.

'Yes?' she said, sounding eager.

'Are you sure about this whole thing?' he asked. 'I mean, I'm experienced…'

'And you're an elf and you're immortal and you know everything, bla, bla, bla.'

'I didn't mean it like that,' he said, looking down. It was true. He hadn't.

She sighed. 'It's all right,' she said sadly.

Legolas frowned. The girl had gone from cheerful to sad all in a space of thirty seconds. He would never get women.

'Are you okay?' he asked.

Annabel looked at him. 'That's sweet of you,' she said.

'Um, I…'

'I know, I know,' she said, waving her hand. 'Look, people tend to underestimate me. I'm not blaming you. I just like to wear dresses at formal meetings.'

'Well, when you put it like that,' began Legolas.

'Of course, only at formal meetings,' she said quickly. 'And only because this dress is really pretty and comfortable. Otherwise I wouldn't be caught dead in it,' she finished happily.

'Ah, okay,' he said.

'Do you have a watch?' she asked him.

'No,' he said.

'Oh, that's too bad.'

'It is a little after sunset now,' he said.

'Yes, I can see that,' she said. 'I needed a specific hour, though. Otherwise I wouldn't have asked. Anybody with a pair of eyes knows that it is after sunset.'

Legolas said nothing but started heading back towards the building.

'I didn't mean that the way it sounded, Legolas!' she called after him.

Legolas sighed and waited for her. This was going to be an interesting little trip.

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Well this is my first story I know it might be a bit boring but please review! It is based on my dream, but it is MY dream and therefore still me creation! :P


	2. Foolish humans and impudent elves

This chapter is a bit short, but needed to hurry through this quickly...

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Foolish humans. They think they know everything. I flew threw them. Look at them, the young ones, so eager to ruin their lives. I swept past them and stopped near a young blond elf and a girl with red highlights in her hair. They were talking.

'I don't know about this whole thing, actually,' the girl was saying. 'You see, I was just sitting down with my granny and watching this lame soap opera when all of a sudden, Mel calls me. I go to my room and say, hey what's up? She tells me that her crazy grandfather wants me to do something for him. I am extraordineverendingly surprised…'

Is that even a word?

'…Not that I mind the old geezer, but-'

'Are you by any chance referring to Mr. Ray?' asked the elf, looking slightly startled at the girl's disrespect.

'Yeah, I mean Wizie. Rayus Optus. Weird name, too. But Melody and Charlie are cool. Anyway, I go to their house and he tells me something happened in Arva-'

'Where?' The elf interrupted.

'Arva. Here. This world. Anyway, he tells me that I need to go to this meeting and travel to some place with somebody from a book.' Here she squinted at the elf hard.

'What?' said the elf.

'Yeah, I know. Sounds crazy, huh? It's almost as if characters from books could come to life,' she scoffed. 'But anyway, Wizie can be a bit weird sometimes. And by a bit I mean a lot.'

Here I stopped and examined the elf carefully. I might have seen him from somewhere before, now that the girl mentioned it…

_Wait,_ I whispered. _The girl mentioned traveling. What does she mean by that? What do you mean by that, girl?_

The girl didn't answer me. Instead, she kept on talking to the elf.

_Are you deaf? _I hissed. I hissed again. Air escaped my throat but no sound came from it. I leaned into the elf's ear and whispered, _Hey, Blondie. Can you tell your girlfriend to stop talking to you and start paying attention to me? In my opinion, I'm way more important._

The damn elf didn't even acknowledge my presence. I began to wonder whether this wizard guy had boxed their ears or something.

_If you wear a really long shirt and turn around you'd look like a girl, _I informed him, to find out if they were just pretending or if they really couldn't hear me.

Apparently, they couldn't.

I let out a sigh in frustration. Out of my throat came this weird quiet whining noise. The elf immediately held up a hand for the girl to stop talking (I didn't blame him) and listened hard.

I was overjoyed. (Not really.) I tried insulting him again. Unfortunately, like last time, he didn't hear me. I huffed. What was the point of offending someone if they didn't even hear it? No point at all, if you ask me.

'What is it?' she asked.

'Nothing,' he said, dismissing it with a quick shake of his head. 'I just thought I heard something.'

_Damn right you heard something, Blondie! _I hissed. He didn't even blink. I hated him.

Oh well, moving on. I left those two nutcases and drifted over to some old people who were talking about something.

'Of course Melody doesn't approve! She didn't want some random elf and her friend putting their lives in danger!'

Another old man shook his head. 'Only because she wants to go herself!'

'Of course she wants to go herself!' The old man who had spoken up first said. He looked surprised. More surprised than he ought to be.

Elf... I flew through the crowd. The only elf there was the blond. Hmm…

The girl had mentioned someone named Melody. What if… what if the girl and the elf were the ones?

I drifted over to them once more. The girl was talking animatedly about cell phones and the boy looked extremely confused.

'But…' he began. 'How can you talk to someone if they're not there?'

She groaned. 'They're _there_, Legolas,' she said. 'The phone is a device that allows you to _talk _to them even if they're somewhere else. Then there's long distance calls…'

I cleared my throat. The boy and the girl stopped talking and looked around.

What? _WHAT? _How dare they! Before, they had completely ignored me! Why the sudden impulse to acknowledge my presence?

'Yes?' the boy said, looking around.

_Are you, by any chance, the two suicidal beings who want to go into the heart of that jungle?_ I asked.

'Whoever it was, he must not have been talking to us,' the girl said. 'Now, back to that shirt you were looking at this morning.'

'What?' said the boy, not grasping the sudden change in conversation.

'The _shirt_,' repeated the girl. 'The one in your closet? The thing that you wear over the top half of your body?'

'What about that shirt?' asked the boy.

Why were they doing this? How could they ignore me like that?

…

Could they even hear me?

Maybe they heard something else when I cleared my throat. Maybe they didn't even know that I existed!

No, of course not. I shouldn't be absurd. Of course they knew of my presence! They were just two normal, impudent teenagers.

'… And I don't want you even _looking _at that thing again if you travel with me! I refuse to date anyone with an atrocity like that!'

I turned round with a huff. If I had lips, they would be stuck in a pout.

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This guy is actually based on someone from another book, I think. I think I might have been thinking about him the night when I had the dream. See if you read it! :)


	3. Humans and their really weird moods

This is a short chapter, nothing really happens. Just for fun. I have a lot of homework, and I am being pushed to get off the computer. So this is the result that you get. :)

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Legolas stroked his horse's silver mane gently. '_Lasto, Meldamiriel_,' he whispered. The horse turned her large blue eyes on him. He smiled and stroked her nose. Just then, a voice interrupted them from behind.

'What did you call your horse?' Annabel strode up to him.

Legolas blinked in surprise. In the place of the dress of the meeting and the strange garments she had worn the day before, there was tight dark brown leather. The jacked went down to her hips, permitting movement in case of need of drastic action. The leggings went down to just below her knees. On her waist she wore a red sword belt, with the sword itself, in its sheath, hung down low. Also, the strange red colour that her hair had taken the days before was gone, leaving her hair simpler and rendering Legolas truly baffled.

'It's really sweet of you to stare at me like that,' she said. 'But you didn't answer my question. What's her name?'

'Meldamiriel,' he said, strapping something on the horse's back. 'She is a gift from my father. He gave her to me to ride to here.'

'So, you mean, you didn't have a horse?' she said, kicking a rock with her booted foot. It splashed into a nearby stream. And promptly hit a big fat bullfrog sitting there. Lazy frog.

It was a nice day for their departure. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, it stank of cows…

Meldamiriel flicked away a fly with one ear. She then cocked her head and inspected Legolas closely. Legolas idly stroked her again.

'I do too have a horse!' he said to Annabel indignantly.

'Ah, now you do, Princie. But did you have a horse before this one?'

Legolas ignored the question and looked around. The road was paved. It was going to be easy going to the forest at first, but only until the path turned to soft sand.

'By the way, where is _your _horse?' he asked. 'You… you're not going to be riding with me, are you?' He was positively horrified by the thought. Not that he disliked Annabel, it was just that she was a bit strange, that was all…

'No. Nice of you to ask, though. I'd really rather ride my bike through the jungle. But it'd run out of gas. So I'm borrowing a horse. Black horse. Real fast.'

'Gas?' Legolas frowned, focusing on what she had said about the bike. 'Bike? _Gas?_'

Annabel cheerfully made a farting noise with lips while Legolas looked at her in horror. Seeing the look on his face, she burst out laughing.

'Back… back to the horse,' she said when she had gotten her breath back. She was trying hard not to look at the extremely confused Legolas' face. It would only set her off again.

'So,' she said, more firmly. 'Did you have a horse before this one?'

Legolas looked down. 'No,' he finally said.

'No?' she said. 'Aren't all princes supposed to have horses?'

'Well, I just ride random horses, when I want to ride,' he said, hopping on Meldamiriel in one graceful movement.

'I don't ride horses,' Annabel said with wide eyes, before starting to giggle again. Legolas looked at her, utterly puzzled.

'But if you're going to be my boyfriend,' she muttered, almost to herself, 'Then you should know about cars. I'll teach you how to drive one day,' she finally decided.

Legolas sighed and scratched Meldamiriel behind her ears. She whinnied. 'Annabel,' he said. 'I am…'

'I mean, we can't just go around riding horses with weird names,' she said thoughtfully, ignoring Legolas completely. 'That definitely wouldn't do. I mean, what would everybody at the pizza parlour think?'

'… _most_ definitely NOT YOUR—'

'Yeah, love you too,' she said absently, then wandered off to find her horse.

Legolas threw up his hands in frustration.

In ten minutes, they were all packed and ready to go. That's when the elders came out in all their glory and hobbling and waving pointy canes. Then one of them had to start some goodbye speech. Legolas, being well experienced as he was, pretended to be paying complete and absolute undivided attention while secretly feeding an apple to his horse. She liked apples, as he had learned.

'Can we go now?' Annabel said in a tone of extreme boredom.

Legolas sighed. That had probably been the wrong thing to say.

The elder stopped talking and frowned at Annabel. His stern, pale eyes gazed coolly at her, masking the feeling of frustration that he felt at having an immature human girl from another world on this quest. Prince Legolas was fine, he was held high and was a noble man. But this girl… he wasn't too sure.

'If you would like,' he said coldly. 'We can make arrangements for _you _to be sent back to your own world, leaving Prince Legolas here to fulfill this quest by himself, as he is obviously a lot more respectful and much more worthy to carry such a great honour.'

Annabel nearly stuck her tongue out at him, but decided against it. However bias the old cod may have been, he was right about one thing. If she didn't behave, they would probably kick her out.

Legolas said nothing, simply prayed that Annabel wouldn't do anything foolish like talking back to the elder. He looked over at her and was relieved to see that she didn't look like she was going to say anything. She just had an extremely grumpy look on her face.

Legolas sighed and took in a deep breath of the fresh air. He was trying to make the best out of this dreary forest. They had taken a map, and he and Annabel had agreed that the first few nights they would stick to the road, as there were more inns and shops and thus places to replenish their resources. Their trip to the jungle was not following the town road, however, so after those first few days they would have to go into the jungle itself.

Right now they were walking along a rather sombre path. Lines of trees ran along on either side. The trees blocked the sun, making it seem darker than was wont this time of the day.

'Annabel,' Legolas said. 'According to the map, there is a town only a few miles down the road. Would you like to stop at it or wait till the next one?'

Annabel said nothing. She had been rather quiet ever since the morning. The talkative and exited human girl of the day before was gone, replaced by a stranger. Not that Annabel had not been a stranger the day before as well, it was just that now she was a very moody stranger, and much less interesting to be with.

'Annabel?' he asked again, looking behind his shoulder. Annabel was staring sullenly at the ground. Her mount, a powerful black stallion, whinnied and trotted forward, hoping to get an apple from Legolas.

'What?' Annabel said sulkily.

'Do you want to stop at the town? Or do you want to wait till the evening?'

'What kind of a softie do you think I am?'

'What? I never said—'

'We'll wait until the evening.'

'Alright.'

Legolas looked at her sadly. She had been in a bad mood all day. When someone was sad or angry around him, it usually changed his mood as well. He felt like cheering he up now. He pursed his lips trying to think about something to do.

Annabel looked up when she heard the first few notes. Then she looked at Legolas. His mouth was open and his lips were moving slowly in song.

The melody was nice and lightened the air considerably. Annabel felt her spirits lift. She did not know the Elven language, but she liked the song. She began to smile.

Legolas looked at her out of the corner of his eye. Smiling, he gently patted Meldamiriel.

'You have a beautiful voice,' Annabel said quietly when he had finished the song.

Legolas smiled again. 'Thank you,' he said. 'At least it did its job.'

'My horse liked it too,' she said, perking up suddenly.

Legolas looked thoughtful for a second. 'Did you name him?' he asked curiously.

'Uh, no,' she said. 'The owner guy said that he didn't have a name. So he's just Horsie for now.'

'Nice name,' he said, chuckling. Then he looked at her for a second. 'You should really name him,' he said.

'I'll name him Black Lightning,' she decided suddenly. Then she grinned. 'BL for short.'

Legolas thought that that was an extremely odd name, but he didn't say so. At least her mood was back.

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Not that bad, actually.


	4. I do NOT look that stupid

**Oh dear. Are you all mad at me? Thank Luna Elen for this chapter. Sorry about that :(.**

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I flew around Blondie and stopped right in front of his face. He kept going and bumped into me. He didn't seem to notice. All he did was force me backwards. Impudent elf.

I puffed myself up and blew at his hair.

Nothing happened. _Nothing!_ It didn't even look like a tiny breath of wind had disturbed his golden princess locks.

It was dark out. It was late evening. I had followed the due through the gloomiest forest one can ever imagine and then through the town gates. It was a really small town, simply a stop for wandering passer-bys. They were on their way to a pub now. I hoped that Blondie was smart enough not to let the girl drink anything that would get her too high.

I had given up trying to communicate with them. I had hissed and whispered almost all the ride through the Forest of Depression. No luck. I had cleared my throat once, when they were going through a particularly dark part of the Gloomazon, and the girl had cringed. The really funny reaction had been on Blondie, though. He had frowned and looked around as if there really was something dark, deep and menacing out there. This scared the girl further; it proved that he had heard me with his highly-oversensitive-good-for-eavesdropping-elven-ears. I had made the weird wheezing sound when I cleared my throat, and I had tried it again. Both times they heard me, or at least Blondie did.

I cleared my throat again now, really cleared it. It was time to try something I hadn't done in a long time.

What was the blonde's name again? Wasn't he from that Lord of the Rings movie or something?

'Goal…' I coughed. Blondie frowned, but kept walking.

_What's your name? _I whispered. What was his name, dammit?

'So, Leggy,' said the girl. 'Do you get drunk a lot?'

Blondie looked at her with a horrified expression. 'No,' he said.

'Why not?'

'I don't drink up to the point of passing out, if I can help it,' he said, probably trying to end the short conversation.

She looked thoughtful. 'But, if you _couldn't_ help it, I mean, if somebody forced you to drink…' She left the sentence hanging in the air.

He sighed. 'Nobody has ever forced me to get drunk before, Annabel,' he said.

'Nobody, like, slipped a pill in your water or something?' she asked.

They kept arguing. Their conversation was interesting, but I didn't learn anything. "Leggy" seemed to be his nickname, one that he did not necessarily seem to like. Oh well. He's stay Blondie for now. Suits him.

I looked around and spied a perfectly innocent man who was behind them, following them to the bar. Wonderful. He would probably be sent to the hospital afterwards, but that was his problem.

As Leggy and Ann tied up the poor smelly horsies, I sneaked up on the man. He had bad breath, but it was late and there was no one else to get.

Unwillingly but resignedly, I circled around his head. I was going to hold my breath. I didn't actually have to breath, but whatever. I liked doing it in tough situations. Not that I had a mouth, a nose, or ever been in a tough situation that I couldn't just float out of.

So, I held my breath and dived in. I decided to go through the head; I wanted to avoid a smelly encounter with his breath as much as possible.

I broke the shell. It was spirit-jarring at first. I hadn't possessed someone in about a month or so. But once I broke through his thick skull, it was easy. It started coming back to me. He didn't have that original a brain. All he was doing was wondering why in the name of his shoelaces did elves always have to wear their hair down and long like that? Not _all _elves, of course. Just some. But still.

I did the good old routine: got in through the main control room and took possession. I put a small pill on the man himself. This one would make sure his mind slept, and remembered nothing of my invasion when he woke up.

He _would_ wake up, of course. I had given him the perfectly healthy, safe pill. Nothing would happen to him. He would be in no need of medical assistance at all when he woke up. Yup, I was _pretty_ sure that I had given him the right pill and not the other one. Ninety percent sure. They did look exactly the same, after all.

Once I had done all the usual checkups, like rolling my eyes, flaring my nostrils, and reciting the alphabet in my head, I was ready to rock and roll. I was pretty sure that this although physically insecure body could contain my energetic, active, wonderful self.

I tried to speak. 'Ahhhhhh,' I said, letting it all out in a rush of air. Leggy turned around and looked at my funny.

'Hello,' I said. Or should I say, tried to say. It came out as: 'Haaaaoooohhh. It was all breathy and weird, too. I didn't test out my new voice yet.

'Um,' he said.

I cleared my throat. Leggy immediately stiffened. I looked at him in surprise before realizing that I had made the same wheezing sounds that I had made in the Forest of Doom.

Shoot. That meant that speaking would be just as hard. But there was something else that I could do…

'Hello,' I whispered. This time it worked. Leggy nodded at me.

'I'm sorry, something was stuck in my throat,' I whispered. 'Still is,' I added.

He nodded again.

'Are you an elf?' I whispered before he could turn away. It was a stupid question, but it was best to appear simple-minded.

'Yes,' he said.

'I heard that elves lived in the woods,' I whispered. 'Did you come from the Forest of Depression?'

'Is that what it's called?' asked the girl.

I nodded my head vigorously. Let them think that I needed help. This guy probably would when I was done with him.

'My name is Don,' I whispered, putting a stupid grin on my face and sticking out my hand. Annabel shook it, and so did Blondie. He had a queer look on his face, though.

I had picked the name out of random. Don seemed common enough for a smelly human.

'I… I go to the pub,' I said with difficulty.

'Oh?' said the girl. 'Come with us, then.'

Blondie spun around and shot her a sharp look, which she didn't seem to notice. 'Annabel…' he hissed.

'What?' she said loudly. 'Let him come, Leggy. Here,' she said, turning to me. 'My name is Annabel and this,' she gestured to Blondie, who was looking quite annoyed by now, 'Is Legolas.'

'Legolas!' I finally remembered how to speak. 'So, he _is _the guy from the movie!'

Legolas looked startled. I had to stop him before he tried to make Annabel explain what a movie was.

'All right, all right. Let's go.' Something was happening. I was gaining my voice. I hadn't spoken in years. Whispers were all that came out of me. It was something about these two… were they making me stronger somehow?

I mentally dismissed the thought. Of course not. They were just two suicidal, idiotic creatures who wanted to go into an enchanted jungle. No reason for that, either. Had someone sent them? How about those old people that I had seen yesterday?

'Where did you come from?' I asked.

Legolas said nothing. Annabel did, though.

'Oh, we came from back there,' she said, waving her hand vaguely behind her.

Humph.

'Wait,' said Annabel suddenly. She turned around with a frowned and then her suspicious gaze settled on me. 'How do you know about the movie Lord of the Rings?'

'Because I watched it,' I stated simply.

'How?' she asked skeptically.

'Um…' Oh sh*t. I had forgotten that there was no TV in Middle Earth ... wait. We were not in Middle Earth! The stupid girl was just trying to trick me!

'… on my _TV_,' I said, emphasizing the last word. 'You know, the magic box?'

Blondie frowned and opened his mouth to ask something but Annabel said, 'Not now, Leggy. Now we eat. I'm starving.'

'But you just ate…' Legolas began.

The girl shot him a glare and looked rather pointedly at me. I must say, I was offended. The idiot whose body I was using couldn't look _that _stupid.

Legolas still seemed confused. 'We are going to the—'

'To the pub, yes,' hissed the girl in his ear. She thought I couldn't hear her, but I could. 'Pubs are the best places to get information, Legolas, you should know that. We can hear something about this map…'

Oh really? We'll see how that goes, then. So they _were _after the map. . .

* * *

Ah, finally. Sorry, I had this in my computer for months. Anyway, reviews are always welcome, folks!


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